Share

Star Wars: The Last Jedi's Rian Johnson on the Future of the Franchise

"Yoda was 100 percent puppet," says Johnson. "They found original molds, and Frank Oz came out and puppeteered him. It was exactly the way they would’ve done it when they shot Empire."

Christopher Jue/Getty Images for Disney

Whether you loved it or hated it (most people liked it), everyone can agree there's a lot to unpack in Star Wars: The Last Jedi. It's 2 hours and 35 minutes of drama, space fights, switched sides, and creatures—at least one of which Mark Hamill drinks from. That's kind of a lot. But don't say Rian Johnson never gave you anything.

And really, fans should expect nothing less from him. Johnson, the writer-director behind the latest installment, is known for making thinking-person's sci-fi, so there was no way he was going to make a Star Wars that was pew-pew-pew and nothing else. Indeed, The Last Jedi is full of existential crises and all kinds of cinematic references—some of which take a couple viewings to catch. (The payoff is worth it, though.)

It also leaves viewers with a lot of unanswered questions. WIRED got on the phone with Johnson shortly after the movie's premiere, and shortly after he was released from whatever gag order Lucasfilm puts on its directors, to get some answers. Here's what he had to say about Terry Gilliam references, the state of his forthcoming standalone Star Wars trilogy, and what he hopes J.J. Abrams does with the next episode.

So, uh, how’s your day been?

Rian Johnson: It’s good. It’s been really good. It feels weird to finally be talking about the movie. You know, it’s so odd, you don’t test-screen these movies because of the secrecy. The first time I saw the movie with a real audience was at the LA premiere, which was nerve-wracking but wonderful because there was this huge enthusiastic response.

With The Last Jedi, you’re in the Empire Strikes Back part of the trilogy. You have to pick up where The Force Awakens left off and set up the next one. What’s the process?

Johnson: It’s very much a baton handoff, it’s a relay race. From VII to VIII and now VIII to IX, we sit down and have a conversation. From VII to VIII it was mostly me asking J.J. Abrams about The Force Awakens and the choices in it. What do you think this meant? What do you think that meant? Getting all the information I can out of him. But from there it’s a clean hand-off, and I think it’s something that’s very important in the storytelling in these movies, I had a free hand to take it where I wanted to take it and make choices about what I thought was going to be best for the dramatic situations and where the story went. The same thing from VIII to IX, and actually I couldn’t give you spoilers if I wanted to. J.J. and Chris Terrio are off writing IX right now and we had a conversation where I just kind of gave them a download of where I left things and the potential that I saw, but the truth is they’re picking it up and they’re going to tell their story and I just get to be an audience member now, to see how they bring it home.

Johnson: Yeah. It’s a bit like that. J.J. was obviously conscious of setting up the possibilities of what could happen in VIII just the way that with the end of VIII I was interested in leaving it with very exciting potential.

"I wasn’t coming in to The Last Jedi thinking, 'We gotta freshen this up! How do I evolve this?' That was the last thing on my mind. But I also came in trying to be unafraid of going to some places if that’s what the story ended up requiring."

So, what can we expect with your new trilogy? It’s obviously going to be separate from the Skywalker Saga. But where do you see it fitting in with the franchise?

Johnson: Well, I don’t know. That’s kind of the exciting thing about it. My entire pitch to [Lucasfilm president] Kathleen Kennedy and Disney was “Let’s tell a new Star Wars story. Let’s tell one story over three movies, where we go new places and meet new people. It’s a brand new story that feels like a great Star Wars story.” That was the extent of it. I didn’t pitch an idea or a time or anything like that. It was just bright blue sky to tell a new story in, and they were so excited about it. Honestly, I’ve been the rigamarole of releasing this movie so I’m just starting to form clusters of ideas for the trilogy, but really the most exciting thing right now is the potential of it.

So is it possible there won’t be any crossover characters?

Johnson: Yep.

That’s the scariest blank slate around.

Johnson: Right? Right?! You can see why I’m so excited about it.

Well, and you can tell me if I’m wrong here, but with The Last Jedi it felt like you were trying to push the idea of what a Star Wars movie could be a little bit further.

Johnson: That wasn’t a stated goal, pushing it forward or changing it or something. I just wanted to make a great Star Wars movie. The thing is I wanted to make a great movie also. That means creating drama with these characters, and that’s going to mean throwing tough stuff at them and taking it to new places. I wasn’t coming in thinking, “We gotta freshen this up! How do I evolve this?” That was the last thing on my mind. But I also came in trying to be unafraid of going to some places if that’s what the story ended up requiring.

Is the new trilogy something you could bring other writers or directors in for? I saw a quote from you the other day where you said you’d like to see more women and people of color directing Star Wars movies, is this an opportunity to do that?

Johnson: Hell yes. Yeah, I’m thinking about that, absolutely. I know I’m going to write and direct the first one, I know I’m going to come up with the story for the entire trilogy. Beyond that, I just don’t know yet. We’re still figuring out how this going to go. But all of those things you just listed are very much on my mind right now.

Do you have dream collaborators?

Johnson: I’ve got plenty. I don’t want to do a list of them right now because I have so many I would inevitably leave out some and then those would be the ones I would end up working with. I have so many folks I know would excel in this world. We’ll see.

So, going back to The Last Jedi I couldn’t help but noticing that in the scene with Luke and Kylo on Ahch-To where Luke briefly considers killing Kylo to stop the darkness in him, that seems to have a bit of the Hitler murder paradox, which came up in your film Looper. Was that intentional?

"If you remember the little drunk alien toad that tries to use BB-8 as a slot machine, that’s actually a mocap performance by Mark Hamill. He really wanted to try out motion-capture after watching Andy Serkis do it."

Johnson: It wasn’t intentional in the sense of “Ooh, I can get a Looper reference in here.” But as I was breaking Luke’s story and Luke and Kylo’s relationship and figuring out what we were going to see of them in the past, and searching for something that would truly be at the core of why Luke has put himself where he is right now. Something that he feels guilty about. It’s also something that Kylo could grab on to and perceive in his own way—the validation in his head that his master did not believe in him. When I landed on that idea, I did immediately think, “Oh, that’s a little bit echoing stuff from Looper.” But not in way that felt like a problem. That connection is definitely there.

Also, it seems like there are some Terry Gilliam references. I swore I heard the authorities on Canto Bight said something about 27B/6...

Johnson: Oh my god! Did you catch that? You caught it, yes! I’m so happy that you caught that. Also, a lot of the creatures have a Gilliam vibe. Also, when BB-8 goes down into the guts of Poe’s X-wing to fix the thing with the sparks I just kept telling them, “Make it more like Brazil. More tubing, more pipes!”

The iron dropping down on the First Order military uniform. That felt like Brazil—or Spaceballs...

Johnson: It was a mocap performance. He really wanted to try out motion-capture after watching Andy Serkis do it. So, if you remember the little drunk alien toad that tries to use BB-8 as a slot machine, that’s actually a mocap performance by Mark. That was just done in one day in a mocap studio.

Yoda. Was Yoda a puppet or CGI this time?

Johnson: He was 100 percent puppet. We actually recreated the puppet from The Empire Strikes Back. They found original molds, and Frank Oz came out and puppeteered him. It was exactly the way they would’ve done it when they shot Empire.

"In this movie I knew we’d be going into some heavier places and I knew we’d be sitting on an island talking about religion for a big chunk of it, so it was important to me to get humor in there."

Talk about the humor in the film. Star Wars movies occasionally have funny moments, but this one had quite a few more.

Johnson: As you grow up as a Star Wars fan it’s easy to start leaning into the heavier aspects of it and the badass aspects of it. That’s a big part of what makes it cool, but I’ve always felt that the humor and the sense of fun, the banter between Threepio, Leia, and Han, is almost like it’s from a ‘30s movie. It’s always light on its feet. There’s always a sense of humor to it. So that was really important to me to get into it. Especially in this movie I knew we’d be going into some heavier places and I knew we’d be sitting on an island talking about religion for a big chunk of it, so it was important to me to get humor in there. For instance, with that prank call [between Poe and Hux] it’s meant to establish right up front to let the audience know that we’re going to have fun here. And if you’re not here to have fun in a Star Wars movie you’ve gotta open your mind a little bit because we’re going to have a good time during this movie. Hop onboard.

So, tell me about the space battles. Were those maneuvers inspired by any real military battles?

Johnson: That’s a good question. Obviously the opening sequence was led by the notion of, I just read a lot about World War II bombing runs—how they worked and how these were big, unmaneuverable beasts that the more nimble fighters would have to protect and how the bombing runs worked. I also looked at a bunch World War II movies. So Twelve O’Clock High was a big reference for me. Just the way that whole sequence played out was very much from studying bombing runs. You can see little cues from other things. For example the ski-speeders at the end. I wanted them to feel very rickety and we kind of went with an open cockpit that was very reminiscent of World War I planes, old biplanes. I thought the notion of this older military technology coming up against the equivalent of a modern Apache helicopter would be really terrifying. Similar to the way [George] Lucas drew from the film The Dam Busters for the trench run for the Death Star, you always try to draw from any real-life source that you can for these things.

I gotta ask, then: Do the First Order or the Resistance have any real-world equivalents in your mind? Any real rebellions?

Johnson: I can’t think of any real-world equivalents that come to mind at all... [Laughs] No, I’m kidding. Take your pick! I think that less drawing from a specific rebellion or a specific situation, it was much more the archetype of a rebellion or the archetype of a resistance. For me that means they’re underdogs, they’re outnumbered, they’re outmatched. And, in this particular chapter, they’re on the run and desperately fighting for their survival. The notion that they should be dead by now but they’re being kept alive basically just by hope, and when that goes they’ll go. That was the foundation, more so than a specific case of rebels.

Right. I ask because I remember back in the day George Lucas compared Darth Vader to George W. Bush and Emperor Palpatine to Dick Cheney, so I was wondering who you think is Kylo Ren and who you think is Supreme Leader Snoke...

Johnson: Hahahaha! I love thinking about it, but I’d be more curious to hear everyone else’s answer. I have a feeling if I say my version of it then it’ll lead to nothing good.